The Impact of Home Motor Affordances on Motor, Cognitive and Social Development of Young Children

Objective The present study evaluated the influence of home motor affordances on motor, cognitive, and social development of young children. Materials & Methods The sample consisted of 49 Iranian children, aged 24-42 months. This study was conducted in Qouchan, Khorasan, Iran in 2015. They was randomly selected by multi-stage cluster sampling from a single community. Participant’s homes were assessed using the Affordances in the Home Environment for Motor Development (AHEMD). The motor behavior of young child was measured with the Denver Developmental Screening Test, aspects of cognitive development (Total cognitive, Verbal IQ, and non-verbal IQ) were assessed using the Stanford-Binet scale, and finally, social development measured by the Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scale. Results Although no statistically significant correlations were found between Total AHEMD scores and motor development, there were significant and positive correlations (P=0.04) for Total AHEMD with total cognitive development (r=0.29), verbal IQ (r=0.29), social development (r=0.33) and (P=0.019), SES (r=0.51) with (P=0.000). There was a significant relationship between the Play Materials subscale of the AHEMD with total cognitive development (r=0.32) with (P=0.024), verbal IQ (r=0.31) and (P=0.029), and social development (r=0.35) with (P=0.012). In addition, there were significant differences between total AHEMD score with parents who had an academic education. Conclusion Motor affordances in the home can have a significant positive influence on a young child’s cognitive and social development.


Introduction
Motor development is a critical factor in child behavior, being associated with the foundation of cognitive and social-emotional development. In the developing infant, motor behavior is shaped by a combination of environmental, organismic, physiological, and genetic factors. Among those factors, the home environment has been established as a primary agent for learning and developing the foundation for positive lifelong behaviors (1). In general, rich environments have positive effects on brain development. There are critical periods in neuronal development in which experience may be the most effective in forging connections (wiring the brain).
From another perspective, these critical periods more recently have been referred to as 'windows of opportunity.' That is the theory that nature opens certain windows for the experience effect starting before birth and then narrows each opportunity, one by one with increasing age. In theory, a series of windows exist for developing (for example) motor control, vision, language, and feelings. The child who misses an opportunity may not fully develop the brain's circuitry to its optimal potential for a specific function. Contemporary research in child development suggests quite convincingly that an optimal level of development occurs in a stimulating environment and strong contextual support (2). Scientists now believe that to achieve the precision of the mature brain, neural function, and stimulation during infancy and early childhood are necessary. That is, optimal development is activity-dependent.
Perspective perceiving and experiencing are the same. The toddler as an active explorer perceives the environmental information and acts on it. The affordances of the environmental challenge the toddler's perception and action (2). Baffordances are opportunities for action that objects, events or places in the environment provide for the animal (3). The affordances include toys, materials, apparatus, availability of space, stimulation and nurturing would increase a toddler's development.
Therefore, the home environment as an affordance can lead to optimal toddler development (4).
The home environment is a rich resource of opportunities that can be conducive to stimulating child development, especially at an early age. For most children, the interior of the home and its immediate surroundings are the first environments they experience throughout their early years.
Children spend the majority of their time at home.
Inside the home, kids have early interactions with family members and access to resources for learning and playing. Availability of stimulating objects, books, and toys in the home are critical indicators for the overall quality of the home environment (5). The home environment is certainly within the host of subsystems that contribute to infant motor development (6,7).
Supporting the home as a medium for growth and learning is ecological (affordance) theory.
Although the term affordance has been interpreted in several ways, for this study it is one of a more for action (8,9). Using of the term affordance does not ignore the reciprocity between organism and environment, which frequently is addressed in experimental work. Since the intent was not to test the precise perceptual-motor mechanisms involved, reciprocity was not relevant (8,9).
Since 2005, one of the most recognized efforts in determining the quality of the home for child motor development has been the Affordances in the Home Environment for Motor Development -Self Report  (12)(13)(14). The majority of homes (80%-90%) provided good or very good affordances in respect to inside space, variety of stimulation, gross motor toys, fine-motor toys, and outside space (15). In a Japanese sample, both psycho-social and physical home affordances influenced young children's motor development (16).  (14).

Results
Overall, 49 young children (51% were female) (homes) participated in the study. The majority of participants were 'an only child' (41%), 45% lived with one sibling, and 14% had more than one sibling. In addition, 65% were not attending day-care and 35% were enrolled. Fifty-five percent lived in apartments and 94% lived in free-standing homes. Seventy-four percent of families had low SES, while 16% were medium, and 10% high.   showing a strong relationship between the home environment with cognitive ability (7, 17-19, 21, 22, 26, 27).
Of the findings noted in this study, the most prominent is the positive effect of home motor affordances on the child's social development.
This result is the most interesting and unique contribution to the study. Although motor affordances were not included in past studies, there is a hint of support that a strong positive relationship is between the home environment with cognitive and social development ability (5,20,(28)(29)(30). For instance, a Korean study reported that children's self-perceived competence and home environment stimulation were positively correlated (28).
Obviously, we did not find a significant positive association between the home motor affordances and motor development of our sample. A few possible explanations come to mind. Foremost is the likelihood that the Denver II test was not sensitive enough to detect differences -that is, in our case the test was too easy for the sample. Our finding for that aspect of the study is in opposition to several reports (11,16,17,(31)(32)(33). In comparison to our results, in Iran, total AHEMD score was the best predictor for motor development (11).
Moreover, in Japan, total AHEMD scores were positively associated with young children's motor development (16). There were significant differences between the AHEMD scores of children with parents who had higher academic education and children of a parent with primary education. Parental education, especially maternal education, could play a significant role in child development (34)(35)(36). For example, play materials and total AHEMD score were influenced by the parents' education level (34). For many families, income and education All authors agreed to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.